DETROIT – There's a year-round swim program in Metro Detroit that is focused on adding more diversity to competitive swimming.
The Razor Aquatics swim team practices six days out of the week and starts training children as young as 5 years old.
"It kind of like builds your character and it shows you how you can work with a team, and how you can build with the team, and how you can count on each other and depend on each other," said 11-year-old Angel Alexander.
Their coach, Jamal Roberts, has over 13 years of coaching experience and started coaching swimming at the age of 18 for the Detroit Recreation Department. He swam competitively for Wayne State University and has a passion for teaching young kids to love the sport of swimming.
"I'm a passionate person, so I pour a lot of energy into the children I work with, and it's mainly about getting them to set the bar high," Roberts said.
The team is open to all demographics, but is dedicated to introducing African American youth in the Detroit area to competitive swimming. The team currently has around 30 kids.
"At this point, it's all black [the team], but I am open to accepting children of any race, it's not exclusive or anything like that. You don't see a lot of that in competitive swimming. When we go to competitions, a lot of times, we will have the club that has the black swimmers there," said Roberts.
Roberts believes it's important to have a team like the Razor Aquatics.
"It's about more than getting children in the pool, children of color in the pool, it's more about getting them to excel. We wanted to specialize in getting young black swimmers involved in the sport, but also succeeding at it on a higher level. You want African American children to understand that swimming is a sport that's not exclusive to other races," said Roberts.
The swimmers also believe it's important to have a team like the Razor Aquatics.
"You don't really see black swimmers swim anywhere so it's like, just to think about us swimming, it's amazing," said 15-year-old Trenten Arthur.
Roberts pushes the swimmers to excel.
"He's kind of a tough cookie, but he's a real good guy," said 13-year-old Keith Simpson. Simpson has been a part of the team for nine years.
"Hopefully I can get to the Olympics and swim with the greats and beat some of the greats," said Simpson.
Parents and grandparents come to support the swimmers on competition day.
"It gives the kids something to do and it keeps them out of trouble. A lot of black children don't even like water and don't swim, so it's something different," said Connie Percy, a grandparent who does not miss a competition.
Roberts plans to continue spreading his love for swimming to young kids for years to come.
"I want them to realize that they're deserving of excellence, so there's no reason they should ever settle for being average," said Roberts.
Roberts hopes his vision will infiltrate the minds of young people and adults in Detroit.
"The picture in their mind is that's not something black people do, but when you can put together a program that has all of these black children competing in swimming, it starts to change that picture where in their mind they can see oh, that is something we do. We want African American children and parents to see it as a normal sport for us versus just something that you know you're venturing way outside of your comfort zone to be a part of," said Roberts.
The team is currently accepting swimmers ages 5-8.